Malnutrition in baby blue tongues, common in the wild?

[SLACkra]

Hey guys,

Just went out to check on the horse and our resident blue tongue. He wasn't under his normal hiding spot, understandably due to the temperature today so I checked under a bit of old carpeting that is near where he normally is. Instead of finding him I found the decaying body of a younger bluey that I had seen in the area only a few weeks ago. There were not obvious signs of trauma and the only thing i noticed was that he seemed to be a bit thin. Is this terribly common in baby bluies? I know it wasn't dehydration as well as since i initially found our resident guy i've kept a bird bath filled with rain water in the shrubs where he lives.

Our resident guy however, last I saw him was in good health though i do feed him scrambled egg once a week or so. Been a bit lazy about it lately with exams and all but i'll whip him up some this arvo. atm giving him about one whole egg a week(shell and all), scrambled with carrot and frozen peas mixed in.

Regards,

Andrew

 

[JasonL]

I don't think anyone could answer that for certain, I'm am unsure if any particular studies have been done on such a subject. I'm sure that young lizards in general have a very high mortality rate caused by predation and illness from being weaker or plain unlucky, only a small percentage make breeding age, thus I hate seeing such large breeders squashed on the roads ( like the one out the front of my house atm ), many of these animals are probably much older than we think they are.

 

[sacred_DUC]

first of all no reason why u should be feeding them,

law of the wild strongest will live the weak die, harsh as that sounds that nature and any number of reason why it could have died disease sickness spider bite etc

 

[salebrosus]

Try Hills Science Diet A/D Formula. High in protein and puts weight on quickly. Costs about $2.30 per tin. I use it on animals that have gone off their food or animals that have been injured or are ill. Good luck!

 

[tattoolizzie]

I'm a total reptile noob, but being wild lizards wouldn't it be likely that they have worms/parasites...?

I'd jut let it be anyway, as someone said before: survival of the fittest and all that.

 

[serpenttongue]

I wouldn't have thought that malnutrition in the wild would be common. I'd like to think that Blueys would be going for the nutritious foods, such as snails, slugs, berries etc. I dont think there's any real 'crap' foods out there for wild Blueys to be eating that would lead to malnutrition..

 

[Tatelina]

You feed a wild lizard....scrambled eggs? Do you give him a knife and fork to eat with as well?

Animals die.
It happens.
It's nature.

The best thing you could be doing for them is make sure there aren't any loose cats around, and don't clear your bushes and scrub from around your place...

first of all no reason why u should be feeding them,

law of the wild strongest will live the weak die, harsh as that sounds that nature and any number of reason why it could have died disease sickness spider bite etc

Agreed.

 

[shamous1]

Decaying

Pretty sure the key word that everyone but the thread poster is missing is, "Found the decaying body".

Would'nt that mean it's already dead??? No formula and TLC will bring it back.

Is it possible that it could have ingested snail bait from the nearby area? Could it have been squashed after someone accidentally passed over the carpet? There's many possibilities.

There's nothing wrong with dropping a bit of food down in the backyard for the wildlife. We drop bread or seed down for birds don't we?